Private Clifford Knight was the youngest son of Arthur and Ellen Knight of Whissendine and at the age of 17 one of the youngest Rutland soldiers to die. He was born in Whissendine early in 1898, and had 11 brothers and sisters. He also had an elder half sister and brother from his father's first marriage. His father Arthur died in 1906 and around that time Clifford went to live with his older brother George in Upper Beeding in Sussex. Another brother Arthur was already in the army fighting when, aged just 16 years old, Clifford enlisted two weeks after the war began. He joined the 3rd (King's Own) Hussars on 15 August 1914 and served with A Squadron. Clifford died of wounds in hospital on 10 October 1915, although the original grave registration report of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission gives his death as 9 May. He is buried in Birmingham's Lodge Hill Cemetery, plot 25, grave B10.2.213A, and is on the screen wall there. But he is not on any war memorial in Rutland and is not mentioned in Rutland and the Great War by George Phillips. His brother Arthur survived the war and named his first born son Clifford. We believe he is in some way related to Stephen Beasley Knight of Whissendine, who died aged 19 in the war.

Pictures below courtesy of Pat Burgess.